Woods

Around lunchtime today I went behind my house and explored the woods. I'm not a huge outdoor person, but I have an appreciation for nature. I find God there every time.

There's something to be said about physically walking away from the world we know into a world that knows nothing about what clouds our thinking. Slowly I found myself breathing in the air of solitude and breathing out the weight of concern I carry about the daily operations of life. After walking about a quarter of a mile down an unknown path, I stopped and spoke to God. I confessed my weaknesses, my failures, and my obsessive need to control everything. I surrendered my inability to do anything well on my own and asked him to speak to me.

As I closed my eyes I must admit I did not hear much, but what I did hear was clear. "Look at your hands," He said to me. I followed those words and looked at my hands, calloused and rough from life. I held my hands there and said, "What would you have me do with them?" I found out quickly that was the wrong question. I have a tendency to ask the wrong questions. Instead, I stopped talking and thought about my hands.

I use my hands to open doors, play music, touch my wife, hold my daughter, cook dinner, fix things, write on a computer, and express much of how I am feeling. I also remembered something someone once told me when I was younger in ministry. They told me it would be through my hands that God would use me. Do I know how? Maybe partially at best. But even that would be a guess.

What was essential to my time with God was I felt close to God. I felt him smile down on me. I felt his embrace. Not completely, but enough to give me strength.

My conclusion? There is power within us, residing in the Holy Spirit. It can be dormant or it can be active. The closer we walk to God, the more we remove our filters, the more the Holy Spirit begins to stir. As it stirs it guides us with wisdom, provides us with strength, and fills us with joy.

Galatians 5:22-23
"But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!"